Hannah

    This is a portrait of Hannah, my friend, colleague and the head organizer at Montana Conservation Voters.  MCV endorses local political candidates who make conservation focus of their platforms and campaigns heavily for endorsed candidates.  This is a photograph of Hannah in her MCV office at around 2 p.m. on election day, well before any election results were posted.  "Pam Ellis", the name directly to the right of her head, was a candidate running for election to the House of Representatives and the primary focus of Hannah's job.  She organized extensive neighborhood canvasses for Pam and interpreted the results of those canvasses into phone lists of voters likely to vote for Pam or those likely to vote for her opponent.  Pam lost soundly that night, as did the majority of MCV endorsed candidates; Hannah was devastated.  This images captures Hannah's hopes, fears, and her great anticipation of the results of the election.  She is sitting at the desk where she spent months planning; the photograph captures a bit of the messiness and chaos that came with her job.  I chose to convert the image into black and white in order to instill a sense of timelessness (the same reason I strove for some graininess in the image) and to enhance the editorial nature of the portrait.